"Is any among you sick?"

My mother went to Catholic school in Ireland when she was a kid, and my father doesn't like to leave the house, and so it's no surprise that neither has set foot in a church as an adult, except for weddings and funerals. The consequence has not been a dearth of belief, but rather an evolution unchecked by orthodoxy: a people-friendly faith.

Last night, for whatever reason, they decided to betake themselves to a church one town over to be healed. Specifically: Dad has pain in his hip, and Mom in her knees. Dad is a closet believer; all his eye rolling is really just a show--a symptom of his inability to embrace anything if there's anyone in the room to see it. Mom's got a glorious dreamscape of belief--bits and pieces from books and memory. He follows her lead, in private, though she doesn't share his fear of ghosts.

"It's true," he tells me today. "I felt a tingling in my hands when I held them up--like little needles."

Nervousness, I think. Circulation, maybe. How long was he holding those hands in the air?

"Some people were passing out--they actually fell backwards into the arms of the people behind them."

I think I've seen that on TV. The fainters have too, probably. Performance pressure. But hey, I get weepy in church listening to "Holy, Holy, Holy"--it doesn't surprise me that somebody might feel lightheaded when their priest channels the healing power of the Almighty.

"Mom's knees felt better right away--she walked up and down the aisle like a 9-year old."

Mom's pain comes and goes. What I wouldn't give for it to be gone forever.

"I don't think I feel any difference in my hip today, but sometimes it takes a few sessions."

For a miracle, you mean?

"It sounds like it was a really powerful experience," I say to Dad, and leave it at that. My faithful aunt attends that church twice a week--has for twenty years. And she's deaf, which she takes to be God's test of her righteousness. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

But I gather she hasn't read Deuteronomy.